FASCISM is an abused word preferred by those who fancy themselves clever yet really have no idea what it actually means.
And then there are the pseudo activists projecting themselves as such with their social media posts yet in reality they’re probably just boring government employees who could not even walk their talk.
Fascism is up there with “red-tagging” as the favorite defence mechanism used by these pseudo activists and pseudo communists when caught with their trousers down.
It is also the go-to word of the usual suspects when they run out of issues to hurl against the government.
As a political ideology, fascism is on the far right of the spectrum while communism or socialism is on the far left, not exactly complete opposites but natural enemies so to speak.
And that is why it is the go-to word of these pseudo communists and pseudo activists aside from “red-tagging”. Of course, “red-tagging” does not exist in the dictionary; it is a made-up word by these pseudo communists when caught red-handed (pun intended).
But we’ll talk about “red-tagging” in another story.
One of the most prominent features of the fascism ideology is that fascists often blamd their countries’ problems on scapegoats. Jews, Freemasons, Marxists, and immigrants were prominent among the groups that were demonized.
Are we sounding familiar here? Remember, during the watch of Noynoy Aquino as President, whenever he committed a major faux pas – which was quite often – he would always blame his predecessor, former president Gloria Arroyo, so much so that he had her incarcerated on trumped up charges manufactured by his then Justice secretary Leila de Lima.
Talk about poetic justice, Leila de Lima is now in jail because of her alleged participation in illegal drugs during her watch as Department of Justice secretary.
Still on fascism, the opposition and their latest “poster boy”, retired Associate Justice Antonio Carpio, and the rest of the three percent have been on a full-scale Sinophobia campaign, blaming the Chinese people and China for just about anything, from vaccine efficacy to the so-called West Philippine Sea.
And they have the temerity to accuse President Duterte a fascist when all their actions and pronouncements have the outstanding feature of fascism.
So much for that. Let’s talk about optimism in the time of COVID-19:
Here are excerpts from an article in the March 2, 2021 issue of www.gavi.org/vaccineswork:
Yes, we’re not there yet but on the optimistic side these five reasons may show that the virus just might be going down:
1. Vaccines are being rolled out
In the UK, 21.1 million people have had at least one dose of a COVID-19 vaccine, and in the USA, this number is 76.9 million. However, vaccine supply isn’t enough – it needs to be met with vaccine demand, and India is a case in point. In January, only 8.4 million people turned up to be vaccinated even though the country had enough supplies to vaccinate more than four times that number. But now, India seems to be seeing an uptick in cases again, potentially taking the country into a second wave.
2. Lockdowns and restrictions have come into place again in much of the world
After a spike in cases, due to winter in the northern hemisphere and holiday celebrations, many countries went into some form of lockdown of varying severities which seems to be paying off with downward trends in COVID-19 cases.
3. Seasonality may be coming into play as we exit winter in the northern hemisphere
Seasonality does seem to have a role in COVID-19 infections, as with other respiratory infections. Some scientists have suggested that vitamin D and sunlight may play a role in reducing COVID-19 transmission. However, this isn’t entirely borne out, as evidenced by a rise in cases in Europe last year in the height of summer.
4. People might be taking measures to stop transmission seriously
Wearing face masks and physical distancing has become part of everyday life, even in countries in the west where wearing a face mask was almost unheard of outside hospitals.
5. The number of people infected is growing
Although we are a long way from achieving herd immunity anywhere in the world, the number of people who have been infected is rising – which some describe as the virus “running out of bodies”. In India, for example, one in five people on average have antibodies to COVID-19, though this number rises to 60% in cities like Mumbai, Delhi and Bangalore. It’s important to note though that while it is still not clear how long natural immunity lasts, so any protection occurring right now from previous infections may be short-lived.
As encouraging as this steep decline in cases is, scientists warn it would be foolish to become complacent now. New variants of COVID-19 are continuing to emerge, and it’s not clear how this will affect the direction of the pandemic, or whether they will mean some vaccines are less effective. (brotherlouie16@gmail.com)/PN
